Avocado industry innovator Charles ‘Gil’ Henry dies at 88

A generation ago, it was nearly impossible to buy a ripe avocado at the grocery store. The industry standard was to sell avocados in their green, rock-hard and unripened state.

That began to change in the early 1980s when Gil Henry started persuading grocers that customers would buy more avocados if they did not have to wait days or weeks for them to ripen on the kitchen sink.

“A lot of people take credit for it, but he more than anybody else was the innovator and the leader who went out to the grocery stores and sold this idea,” said Al Vangelos, an agricultural consultant and former president and CEO of Calavo Growers.

Mr. Henry died of lymphoma on May 18 at his home in the San Pasqual Valley. He was 88.

By building the first forced-air ripening room in the avocado industry in 1983, Mr. Henry ensured that his Henry Avocado Corp. could provide a consistent supply of ripe avocados whenever the grocery stores needed them.

“A lot of people said he was kind of nuts and that this wouldn’t work, but now it’s the norm,” said Vic Varvel, vice president of packing at Henry Avocado. “His tireless work on (ripening rooms) changed the industry for the better.”

Along with his brother Warren, Mr. Henry also developed one of the earliest farm management programs in the avocado business. Working directly with other farm owners to manage their orchards and pack the fruit, Mr. Henry established more control over avocado supply lines to meet the demand of grocery stores.

“He wasn’t afraid to take the risk in a situation if he saw something that the thought had to change,” Varvel said. “He was able to see that vision when a lot of people thought it just wasn’t possible.”

Realizing that there was a need for better marketing and promotion of avocados, Mr. Henry helped establish the California Avocado Advisory Commission in the 1960s. That group, which brought together growers and distributors, was a precursor to today’s California Avocado Commission.

“He was filled with ideas,” said Phil Henry, current president of Henry Avocado.

Mr. Henry’s impact crossed international borders, too. The Mexican government hired Mr. Henry as an agricultural consultant in the 1950s. He went to the state of Michoacán, where most farmers at the time were growing coffee, and advised farmers who wanted to start growing avocados.

Today, Michoacán is the most productive avocado-growing region in the world.

“At that time the most preferred variety was the Fuerte avocado,” said Carlos Illsley, whose family began working with Mr. Henry in Mexico in the 1950s. “He was a little bit ahead of things and was already certain that the Hass avocado had a better future.”

Mr. Henry was an early promoter of the Hass avocado because it had a thicker skin and was thus less susceptible to bruising, said Phil Henry. The Hass trees also grew a more predictable crop than the Fuerte trees, he said.

Charles Gilman “Gil” Henry was born in Los Angeles on Jan. 29, 1925, the same year his parents planted their first avocado grove off what was then Hill Avenue — now El Norte Parkway — in Escondido. Mr. Henry grew up alongside the first avocado trees. He went to Woodbury University in Los Angeles to study business and also attended Syracuse University for its army engineering program. He served as an army corporal from 1942 to 1944.